Some Thoughts About the Meta

[MewMew3]

You hear people complain how Yugioh is broken, and it could be fixed if only they balanced out the game by banning some cards, making new ones, and so on.

 

I think the game is broken to the core because, unlike Pokemon and Magic, it has no floodgates to control the game. The game wasn't bad when it first came out but now it's cancer. Playing with most decks these days means spending 30 minutes on your Main Phase setting up a field, with battling your opponent as an afterthought, so much it is somewhat like playing solitaire. 

 

I don't suggest adding anything like Energy or Mana cards to the game; they're hideous and clog up a deck. I have other thoughts, only musings, which will probably never be put into practice, but I'm not expecting that anyway. Just a few thoughts on a boring Saturday.

 

Manga Rules

The Yugioh card game in the manga seems to have a pretty answer. You could only Normal Summon 1 monster per turn, set/activate 1 Spell per turn, and set/activate 1 Trap per turn.

 

All manga Spells work like our Quick Play Spells (you can activate them on your opponent's turn but can't activate them after you set them). The catch is most Spells can't directly protect you or your opponent's monsters from your opponent, so you have to use Spells in a more roundabout way for defense. Traps, however, make solid guards.

 

Manga Yugioh has a kind of poker element to it. You can Set 2 cards facedown but 1 will be a Spell and 1 will be a Trap and your opponent has to use that implied knowledge to work around your tactics. If you play 1 Spell, you can only set 1 card, a Trap, which could be an obvious ambush or a bluff. Again, your opponent will have to think through their options.

 

Forbidden Memories / Duelists of the Roses Rules

You can play only 1 card from your hand per turn. You can, however, combine cards in move as a combo, or toss away cards from your hand, and then you can draw more cards until you have 5 cards in your hand again. The rule would work way better if we played the game on a DoR board, as your Life Points won't be so bare. Either way, it makes Yugioh a little more like chess, forcing you to think more deeply, which is nice.

 

Deck Cost

Hosts could hold tournaments where players could not make a deck exceeding a set deck cost. A 700 deck cost limit would really force players to pick and choose among stables like Pot of Greed and Raigeki, while something a 2000 deck cost limit means everything goes. Tournaments with deck costs would most likely be held online since the computer could easily calculate your deck cost for you.

 

Anime Meta

I always found anime duels to be more interesting than real life duels, especially in Duel Monsters, probably because anime characters didn't abuse cards like Raigeki or Yata. Yugi and pals did seem to play under a kind of meta, which is hard to tease out, but I'll try. Anime meta was sort of like this:

 

-Cards that directly destroyed your opponent's cards (like Fissure, Heavy Storm etc.) were limited to 1, while very cheap cards like Dark Hole and Raigeki were banned outright. The anime put the emphasis on battle, not giant Main Phases. 

 

-Many drawing cards like Pot of Greed and Card of Sanctity were out there but limited to 1. Pot of Greed was tolerable in the anime because people didn't use Heavy Storm and Raigeki on the same turn.    

 

-Most burn cards seemed limited to 1, while "direct damage" cards like Tremendous Fire and Meteor of Destruction were banned.

 

-Maybe there was an overall limit to the number of cards listed above a player could use; like you could only use 10 such "super cards", so you had to pick and choose carefully what cards you wanted to use. 

 

The banning and limiting of so many overpowered destruction cards meant players had to coordinate their monsters better. They couldn't just stack their Deck with staples like we (kind of still) do. I would say Yugi and pals in Dark Side of Dimensions showed a nice balance between Anime Yugioh and IRL Yugioh.

   

 

 

[Mr. Best Male 2008]

"I think the game is broken to the core because, unlike Pokemon and Magic, it has no floodgates to control the game. The game wasn't bad when it first came out but now it's cancer. Playing with most decks these days means spending 30 minutes on your Main Phase setting up a field, with battling your opponent as an afterthought, so much it is somewhat like playing solitaire."

 

I tldr'd everything after this because why rant about the meta when you don't understand it in the first place.

[TF2_The_Scout]

 

I think the game is broken to the core because, unlike Pokemon and Magic, it has no floodgates to control the game.

[spoiler=no floodgates]

 

http://yugioh.wikia.com/wiki/Vanity's_Emptiness

http://yugioh.wikia.com/wiki/Imperial_Order

http://yugioh.wikia.com/wiki/Vanity's_Fiend

http://yugioh.wikia.com/wiki/Amorphage

 

 

 

Those rules all sound too restrictive to me. Manga rules forcing me to activate only 1 kind of card per turn sounds like it could drive the game to a halt if implemented IRL and DoR rules sound even worse. How would you even play that IRL without a massive map of a playmat? Would it come in different tile patterns?

 

For the anime meta bit, I think that those were made purely to make the duel look interesting because, you know, it's an anime and therefore needs to entertain. If the duels were more realistic, then I have no doubts that they would run cheaper cards like Raigeki. I mean, would you watch a 30 minute episode of main phase 1 combos for setup?

[MewMew3]

@, TL;DR.
 
@@MetalSonic, I think we should read what I wrote a little more closely. My first sentence reads:
 

You hear people complain how Yugioh is broken, and it could be fixed if only they balanced out the game by banning some cards, making new ones, and so on.

You're kind of doing just that. You're pointing to certain cards and saying, "We have floodgates to help balance out the game." When I said the game is broken, I mean in its very core, the very way the game is made. Right now, card effects are too long and the game is too focused on playing solitaire during your Main Phase. No correcting of the banlist or making more floodgate cards will fix the game at this point.  The only way we could possibly reverse that is if we chuck out every card except the first 1000 or so "classic" cards, but no way would anyone want to do that.
 

Those rules all sound too restrictive to me. Manga rules forcing me to activate only 1 kind of card per turn sounds like it could drive the game to a halt if implemented IRL.freshing to try it out.

 
Maybe. Maybe not. I can't say I know how the game would actually turn out, but I would find it refreshing.
 

DoR rules sound even worse. How would you even play that IRL without a massive map of a playmat? Would it come in different tile patterns?

 
DoR dueling would be best done on a computer. All that exists right now for DoR is the PS2. *shrugs*

 

For some reason, I have always excelled at all the Yugioh games EXCEPT the TCG. Forbidden Memories? I pushed as far as one can go without cheats. Duelists of the Roses? Same, love it. Dungeon Dice Monsters? I blitzkrieg my opponents. Capsule Monsters Chess? Call me Magnus. But the TCG? Ewwwwww...
 

For the anime meta bit, I think that those were made purely to make the duel look interesting because, you know, it's an anime and therefore needs to entertain. If the duels were more realistic, then I have no doubts that they would run cheaper cards like Raigeki. I mean, would you watch a 30 minute episode of main phase 1 combos for setup?

 

 

Well, Raigeki was explicitly banned in Battle City, as were Hinotama and Meteor of Destruction. That was why it was such a big deal when Marik possessed Joey, because he added all kinds of banned cards in Joey's deck.

 

Playing Raigeki or a 30 minute combo setup are not the only two options that exist. Most of that massive setup comes from cards having such long effects these days, especially with Monsters overshadowing Spells and Traps. On one hand, it helps all kinds of decks be more consistent. On the other hand, Konami pushed things too far.

 

I guess what I'm searching for is a golden mean because, in my fanfics, choreographed duels like the game in real life (with 30 minute setups and all) look terrible on the page. They end up putting technical aspects of the game in front of character development and conflict. I would like to overcome those aesthetic hurdles. Right now, the golden means seem to be Duel Links and Dark Side of Dimensions, but there must be something better.

[Dova]

You're kind of doing just that. You're pointing to certain cards and saying, "We have floodgates to help balance out the game."

He hasn't said whether the game is broken or not. He's not talking about banning cards or making new ones, or saying the game is balanced right now. All MetalSonic said was that the lack of floodgates wasn't an issue.

 

Maybe. Maybe not. I can't say I know how the game would actually turn out, but I would find it refreshing.

Remember, something has to be at least somehow good in order to be refreshing. Not saying this wouldn't be, but think about what your changes would actually change about the game.

 

DoR dueling would be best done on a computer. All that exists right now for DoR is the PS2. *shrugs*

 

So, we're not considering this option. Well, I hope you're not, as his would cut out the actual TCG portion of this game.

 

For some reason, I have always excelled at all the Yugioh games EXCEPT the TCG. Forbidden Memories? I pushed as far as one can go without cheats. Duelists of the Roses? Same, love it. Dungeon Dice Monsters? I blitzkrieg my opponents. Capsule Monsters Chess? Call me Magnus. But the TCG? Ewwwwww...

Why do you think this is? I have absolutely no idea, but changing the gamestate so that you're better at it isn't very encouraging towards how your suggested changes will benefit everyone.

 

Look, I haven't played DoR or Capsule Monsters. DDM was fine, I guess, nothing particularly interesting, but I loved playing Forbidden Memories. It was simple, fast, and the Fusion mechanics were really fun. But that wouldn't be YGO; we can't have such strict limitations on Summoning and such in a gamestate where every second card Summons itself without ditching half the current card pool.

 

Custom format with ditched cards? Sure. But don't talk about it "fixing" Yu-Gi-Oh if you're going to cut out most of it. (NOTE: I'm fine with cutting out a few cards; that's what a banlist is for.)

 

I guess what I'm searching for is a golden mean because, in my fanfics, choreographed duels like the game in real life (with 30 minute setups and all) look terrible on the page. They end up putting technical aspects of the game in front of character development and conflict. I would like to overcome those aesthetic hurdles. Right now, the golden means seem to be Duel Links and Dark Side of Dimensions, but there must be something better.

 

This is a fair enough reason, I guess, and I have no problem with you trying to come up with your own format for your duels. That's fine. In fact, if it makes for an interesting read and actually has strategy, unlike most anime/manga duels, then kudos for you.

 

---

 

Time for the actual OP response.

 

No real responses to your anime/manga suggestions, as they make monsters even MORE powerful in relation to Spells/Traps. If you combined it with your DoR suggestions in some way, maybe, but right now neither idea is really fleshed out. You don't have much clearly defined in terms of ideas here, so I can't comment on whether or your idea as a whole would work. Each individual idea completely breaks 90% of Yu-Gi-Oh, so you would have to get rid of most of the current gamestate. Less of Yu-Gi-Oh, more of an original card game that uses some cards.

 

Deck Cost dependence is a silly idea. A cost of a card is a completely variable concept decided by the market, and if cards were not be able to be used because of certain costs, their costs would gradually go down as they wouldn't become so valuable, and who knows how it would turn up. Even ignoring that, it'd be a shame to lock someone out of the tournament with a deck given to them by a friend who gave up the game because their deck was too good. For casual formats in a store, there's no reason not to do that, but for an official thing, it's ridiculous.

 

You just talk about banlists in your last option. Anime rules from DM don't really make much sense in a modern context, but there's nothing wrong with applying concepts from them to today's meta.

 

Basically, you mention it in your original post, but you don't seem to say if you are actually doing it or not; do you want to remove a large portion of the current TCG card pool, or work around most of it?

[The Warden]

I'm going to say this once, so listen well @@MewMew3. While it's all well and good to disagree with someone, there is absolutely NO NEED to use insulting names for your naysayers, especially when they didn't escalate it themselves. You get one warning here, so repeat this and actions will be taken. Understood?

[MewMew3]

I'm going to say this once, so listen well @@MewMew3. While it's all well and good to disagree with someone, there is absolutely NO NEED to use insulting names for your naysayers, especially when they didn't escalate it themselves. You get one warning here, so repeat this and actions will be taken. Understood?

 

I thought Desperate Sellout was Metal Sonic's actual username. Apologies to him.

[MewMew3]

@@Dova, I'm not making this into a zero sum game. I thought of other ways Yugioh could be played. It does not preclude the current game in any way. For instance, I thought of (somehow) hosting Forbidden Memories or Duelists of the Roses tournaments, but that doesn't mean I'll go demolish the card shop next door. I won't go Kim Jung Il (or Michael Pence - pick your poison) and make my Yugioh the only Yugioh in the world.  
 
I'm "fixing" Yugioh for my fanfics. In these first writings, the meta in the fanfics matches the meta in real life. In Season One, the meta is like our meta in 2004-2008, hence all the Chaos Control, Monarchs, and DAD decks. In Season Two, the meta is like our meta in 2015-2016, hence all the Turbo Towers and Draco pendulum stuff. Season Three, the meta is like our meta in 2017-2018, with all the new link monsters. My main characters tend to use rogue decks, and you can't go rogue if there is no meta to go rogue against.
 
Only problem is the duels look terrible on the page and focus is taken away from conflict and character development. They would look better in animation or live action, because the format would be visual, meaning no word clutters, but the chances of that happening are almost zero. So I have to make some kind of compromise or make the fanfic meta more like the anime meta, but still somehow have it resemble real life meta. Welcome to my world.
 

Each individual idea completely breaks 90% of Yu-Gi-Oh, so you would have to get rid of most of the current gamestate. Less of Yu-Gi-Oh, more of an original card game that uses some cards.

 
I'm aware of that, hence my first paragraph. I notice Duel Links looks like it's revamping the game from the ground up. The developers are crafting Duel Links meta in a very careful way. To each his own, really.
 

Basically, you mention it in your original post, but you don't seem to say if you are actually doing it or not; do you want to remove a large portion of the current TCG card pool, or work around most of it?

 

 

I did say they were just thoughts I mulled over on a Saturday afternoon. I doubt I would put my ideas in action beyond my fanfics. If I did, I would just make different forms of Yugioh that would coexist together. I play whatever kind of Yugioh I want depending on my mood, like how I play a different installment of Mario Party whenever I feel like it. 

 

People online tend to react very strongly to me online. I guess it's because I sound aggressive and radical when I don't mean to.

[TF2_The_Scout]

Yes, I did read what you wrote. You said that the reason YGO is broken is that unlike Magic and Pokémon, we don't have floodgates, so I therefore posted examples of floodgates that we do have. If you'll notice, a lot of the floodgates that we do have are limited, banned, have a condition that makes them impractical to use, or are part of decks that aren't exactly top tier(such as Necrovalley). From what I've seen, people generally consider floodgates unhealthy for the game because of forcefully shutting down a certain aspect of the game, thus bringing the game to a grinding halt.

 

 

I thought Desperate Sellout was Metal Sonic's actual username. Apologies to him.

DID YOU JUST ASSUME MY GENDER!?

 

 

@@Dova, I'm not making this into a zero sum game. I thought of other ways Yugioh could be played. It does not preclude the current game in any way. For instance, I thought of (somehow) hosting Forbidden Memories or Duelists of the Roses tournaments, but that doesn't mean I'll go demolish the card shop next door. I won't go Kim Jung Il (or Michael Pence - pick your poison) and make my Yugioh the only Yugioh in the world.  
 
I'm "fixing" Yugioh for my fanfics. In these first writings, the meta in the fanfics matches the meta in real life. In Season One, the meta is like our meta in 2004-2008, hence all the Chaos Control, Monarchs, and DAD decks. In Season Two, the meta is like our meta in 2015-2016, hence all the Turbo Towers and Draco pendulum stuff. Season Three, the meta is like our meta in 2017-2018, with all the new link monsters. My main characters tend to use rogue decks, and you can't go rogue if there is no meta to go rogue against.
 
Only problem is the duels look terrible on the page and focus is taken away from conflict and character development. They would look better in animation or live action, because the format would be visual, meaning no word clutters, but the chances of that happening are almost zero. So I have to make some kind of compromise or make the fanfic meta more like the anime meta, but still somehow have it resemble real life meta. Welcome to my world.
 

 
I'm aware of that, hence my first paragraph. I notice Duel Links looks like it's revamping the game from the ground up. The developers are crafting Duel Links meta in a very careful way. To each his own, really.
 

 

 

I did say they were just thoughts I mulled over on a Saturday afternoon. I doubt I would put my ideas in action beyond my fanfics. If I did, I would just make different forms of Yugioh that would coexist together. I play whatever kind of Yugioh I want depending on my mood, like how I play a different installment of Mario Party whenever I feel like it. 

 

People online tend to react very strongly to me online. I guess it's because I sound aggressive and radical when I don't mean to.

 

So, let me get this straight. You want to "fix" the IRL meta for the sake of your fanfictions? You mention that the MP1 combos look terrible on paper. Well yeah, because the thing we want to focus on is the characters and the battle phase because that is more interesting. In IRL, we probably already know our opponent and don't need a monologue explaining character motivation or if playing online, we generally don't care enough to get to know our opponent.